


all the pretty things that we could be

by withkissesfour



Category: Holby City
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-30
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 22:46:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9519302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withkissesfour/pseuds/withkissesfour
Summary: She wants to kiss her goodnight, tell her (thank you, thank you, I want you) against her warm mouth.Bernie and Serena, and their many first dates.





	1. a quick bite after a long shift

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Little Numbers by Boy

She asks her out to dinner while she’s shirtless. 

Her shirt is stuck over her head; and she’s flailing blindly in the middle of the change room when she hears footsteps, tries to duck behind something, _anything._

‘Need a hand?’ asks a soft, amused voice and Serena halts in her vain attempts at freeing herself. 

‘Bernie?’

‘Your everyday hero. I’m coming closer, okay, just stay still’. 

Serena pauses, clears her throat, tries to steady herself when Bernie’s knee bumps against hers, when her hand brushes against the strap on her shoulder; and the only clear thought in her head is a silent admonishment, a reminder to wear less boring bras if there’s a chance Bernie Wolfe will catch you in one of them. 

One tug and she’s free, and Bernie is there - dishevelled, exhausted, gorgeous; looking at Serena like she wants to kiss her, like she might kiss her. She’s quite close, close enough for Serena to count the freckles, the wrinkles, to know she is doing the calculations She’s trying to figure out how long it would take to manoeuvre Serena around the seat, against her locker, undo her bra (ten seconds, give or take?); trying to figure out how bad of an idea it is (how bad could it really be?). 

It’s only when Bernie breaks her gaze, blinks a few times, decides against it, that Serena remembers she’s half-naked. She tugs the shirt against herself, steps back a few paces, racks her brain for something to say that doesn’t sound like flirting. It’s harder than she’d thought.

‘Long day, huh?’ she settles on, and watches as Bernie clears her throat, offers a nod, a smile, an over-enthusiastic _right?!_ before shrinking back, shuffling her feet, the shoelaces coming undone on her sneakers. She looks like she’s willing the earth to swallow her up; but the linoleum stays there, solid, beneath her, and she eventually lifts her head back up, one hand rubbing her neck, to Serena - who sort of _hovers,_ between shirts. 

‘Would you like to get a bite to eat somewhere?’ 

‘Like, do you mean like a date?’ 

It comes out of her mouth before she even thinks about it, and it’s her turn to beg the ground to open up; to wish the shirt was back stuck over her head so she wouldn’t see Bernie’s face, so Bernie wouldn’t see her - blushing beet red.

‘I just - I just’, she stammers, ‘I just meant some dinner’.

‘Well you did take my shirt off’, Serena replies, a strained attempt at a joke; and Bernie laughs a little - a quiet, tinkering laugh, which turns into a wide, steady smile when she adds, earnest,  _I’d love to._

And the smile stays, makes her eyes bright and her cheeks pink, when Serena moves towards her locker; as they watch each other undress, dress, sneaking glances when they think the other isn’t watching. 

-

The thing is, it feels like a date. 

They take Bernie’s car from the hospital; and the news plays soft and low on the radio, and she wants to hold her hand over the gear stick, wants to know how they feel tangled up in her fingers - strong and soft and steady, not whispered around her ear or gripping blindly at her waist. 

They pick a table by the window, of the small Italian restaurant, with the checkered table-clothes and the bread in the basket and the candle between them. Serena picks a bottle of Shiraz, from the tired-looking waiter in the tired-looking apron; kicking Bernie gently under the table for grumbling when she _ums_ and _ahs_ about it - looking over the long long list of wine. She wants to know how it would feel to kick off her shoe, trace her foot up the length of Bernie’s calf, her thigh. She wants to know what Bernie’s face would look like, lit up by the candle, by the wine, by her company - by her foot making its way up and down her black skinny jeans. 

They order another bottle, and Serena starts to feel heady, adolescent; knows she’ll regret every drop in the morning - with her head beating a familiar rhythm. But Bernie keeps up with her (can _really_ hold her drink) and tells story after story, joke after joke, watches and listens and laughs and laughs and _laughs_ her loud barking laugh, where you can hear every syllable; and they stay until the place closes. 

She opens the door for her, and Serena slides past, very close, barely resists the urge to turn, bury her face in between the lapels of Bernie’s coat, in the crook of her neck; breathe her in, commit it to olfactory memory (homebrand soap, old cigarettes, coffee, _her_ ). Instead she stumbles out into the cold, onto the cobblestones, lets Bernie steady her as they make their way towards her car.

She walks Serena to her door, waits while she rummages for her keys, bites at her bottom lip when Serena raises her gaze to meet her eyes. She wants to kiss her. She wants to kiss her goodnight, tell her ( _thank you, thank you, I want you)_ against her warm mouth, remnants of bolognese staining the corners of her lips. It feels _wrong_ not to kiss her. 

She rocks back and forth a little on her heels, light-headed, indecisive, her eyes fixed on Bernie; who leans forward before she does. Her lips land somewhere between her left jaw and cheekbone, just north of her mouth. She lingers there a second, lets her nose bump against Serena’s as she pulls away; and mumbles _g’night_ very close, her warm breath making clouds in the cold night air.


	2. the whole dating thing.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They don’t go somewhere horribly expensive, they don’t go to a fancy restaurant. They go to their antebellum place.

She asks her out to dinner in their office, her foot tracing the inside of Serena’s calf.

She’s been back a week, and they can barely keep their hands off each other. They had spent the weekend at her place, naked limb around naked limb, tangled and sweaty in the crisp winter air - apologies, platitudes,  _I love you (I love you, I love you_ ) mumbled against bed-warm skin. Nerves had given way to want, inexperience to pleasure, and a brief stab of self-consciousness (Serena’s blushes hidden in the crook of Bernie’s shoulder, Bernie’s face hidden by a mess of hair) had faded into nothing; overwhelmed by joy, adoration, desire, which fill her body to the brim, until she felt like she might drown in them.

 She had let Serena make a map of it, of her body, in the bright, unforgiving light of her bathroom on a bright, unforgiving Monday. She had made her a cartographer of stretch marks and freckles and battle scars, and fresh blossoming bruises and all the places she has touched (all the places Bernie wants her to touch again); andher confident, curious fingers had made her  _ache._ She had felt unfairly happy, exhausted, adolescent - buoyed by coffee-bitter kisses and skilled hands making quick work of freshly ironed blouses, and Serena’s soft early morning conversation from the passenger seat of her car (her hand playing with the loose thread on the thigh of her jeans).

So it takes every ounce of self-restraint not to kiss her in the elevator - in the seconds that drag between stops - or hold her hand in line for coffee, or while away the minutes before work making out like teenagers in her car; the handbrake poking into her hip. It every method of distraction not to guide her against her desk, the wall, her chair, the cabinet, when she sees her in their office, stretching her back with a yawn, when all she can think about is the trembling arch of her body off the bed the night before, the way she moaned her name. She wants her hands in her hair and underneath her shirt and against her thigh, wants Serena to fumble blindly to find purchase on the surface behind her.

Instead she buries her head in cases and a stream of patients, until their bodies slow, until they steady, until they fall into an easy domesticity, a rhythm of coffee and casefiles and a banter – which swerves between comradery and flirtation, and makes her brave.

It’s Thursday afternoon, and Serena is surrounded by a wall of paperwork, fumbles a pen absent-mindedly between her fingers, not looking up when Bernie clears her throat.

‘Would you like to go out on a date – with me – tonight?’ she asks, covering her clumsiness with a cough; peering at Serena through her fringe. There is a twinkle in Serena’s eyes, and a twitch at the side of her mischievous mouth, when she glances upwards at Bernie.

‘You know we’re sleeping together, right?’

Bernie cocks her head, throws a _be serious_ look across the table – but a wide grin has settled on her lips, and she shakes her blonde waves loose, counts her lucky stars.

‘No, I know that’, she says, raising her eyebrows. She shuffles further down in her chair, knocks her foot against Serena’s. ‘I want to _date_ you’.

Serena squirms a little, shifting in her seat as Bernie’s toe begin to trace absent-minded patterns in the inside of her calf, but she keeps her face set in a small steady smile.

‘You know, the whole thing’, she says, ‘Pick you up, take you somewhere fancy, somewhere horrid expensive, pay the bill, kiss you in the carpark, kiss you at your front door, kiss you - ’

The door is flung open then, and Morven carries the sounds of the ward in with her, the howl of a child, the squeak of wheels, the high ringof the red phone; and Bernie swallows her words down with a bite of her lip, a wry smile, a glance at Serena as they drag themselves from their chairs. And they won’t talk about it for the rest of the day – won’t get a second to catch a breath or inhale a coffee – but Bernie flies high for seven hours after Serena catches her hand on the way out of their office, leans in close, mumbles _pick me up at eight?_ against a pile of hair.

-

 

The dress, which she tugs at (a little nervous, a little shy) hugs at her waist, hangs just below her knees, plunges in the middle of her neckline, and Bernie forgets how to put a sentence together. She just sort of stares, her mouth perilously close to gaping, her eyes studiously avoiding her chest; training themselves somewhere near her left ear. Serena’s face brightens, softens with affection and she leans forward, shuffles a hand through Bernie’s vaguely tidier fringe, smooths a hand down the sleeve of her white shirt (crinkled from the bottom of her locker, impervious to any hurried attempts at an iron) to grasp her fingers, give her hand a small squeeze with the pad of her thumb.

‘You scrub up nice.’

‘You – you don’t look so bad yourself’, Bernie replies, and it had sounded good in her head, but comes out cracked and jumbled, with a blush and a shake of her head – because Serena is _magnificent,_ and Serena is holding her hand; isn’t letting go.

‘Don’t worry’, she says, sidling into the passenger seat of Bernie’s car, her tongue poking through her teeth and a reassuring pat on Bernie’s bouncing leg, ‘we’ve already got the sex part under control – how hard can the rest of it be?’

Bernie lets out a loud, honking laugh; pauses as she puts on her seatbelt to lean over; kiss her happy mouth with her happy mouth.

-

 

They don’t go somewhere horribly expensive, they don’t go to a fancy restaurant. They go to their antebellum place.

Bernie peers over at Serena as they make their slow way down the cobblestones to the small Italian restaurant, with the red-checkered tablecloths, and the candles burning low; and her grip on Bernie’s hand (steadying her on the uneven ground) loosens.

‘Everything okay?’ she asks, as she moves to open the door, as they are shuffled towards the same table by the window, next to the large kids’ party – loud, stretched over three tables. It’s only when the waiter moves away that Serena shoots her a smile, pursed.

‘Same place?’

‘Is that okay?’

‘Course’, she says, then pauses, inspects Bernie, whose brow has furrowed, whose chest has tightened, who fights the urge to run, run now, before she screws it up anymore. It had been careless, stupid, to bring her here - a clumsy attempt at repeating their pre-war dinner date, at making this _their_ place. She sees Serena’s expression soften a little, and she feels a stocking foot against her ankle, between jeans and shoes – lightly, briefly, ‘Of course, darling.’

Her face is light, but her tongue is heavy, and for a while all Bernie can think about is how much she hurt her when she left, so the evening starts off slow, stitled. They have to shout a little, lean in close to hear each other over the dozen or so children; and the crackled music on the speaker is an endless remix of garbled Dean Martin covers – which endeared them last time, and annoy them now. The restaurant feels like a battlefield; and the tension hangs in the tangles of Bernie’s hair, sits in the breadbasket between them, the space between their hands. Contrition, remedy, justification all hang on her tongue, as they have done for weeks, and she fidgets with her bare and chipped nails; until Serena places a hand on top of hers, stills them.

‘Before you left, when you asked me over for dinner’, Serena starts, and Bernie can’t bear to look at her, busies herself with the fresh nail polish on Serena’s slender fingers. ‘Would you have taken me to bed?’

‘Yes’, she answers quickly, ducking her head and clearing her throat, ‘Would you have come?’

Serena sniggers, and Bernie blushes, sinks a little lower in her chair, willing the words back in her mouth, trying to grasp them from the air in front of her. She dares a peek at Serena, whose eyes are bright with laughter, but whose mouth is earnest and shoulders are set, as she leans close to Bernie – raises an eyebrow, whispers _yes;_ before settling back in her chair.

‘Well then’, Serena adds, with a sigh, ‘I’m sorry I scared you away.’

Bernie whisks her hair out of her eyes, tangles her fingers in Serena’s.

‘I’m sorry I got scared. Won’t happen again.’

‘Promise?’

‘Scouts honour’, she says, raises a hand in the air, a careful, cautious smile creeping across her face as another bottle of wine lands between them; and Serena laughs, and Bernie thinks this might be her new favourite place in the world.

-

 

She drives her home, a pile of leftovers in a bag on the backseat, stomachs and hearts and heads very full; faces warm and mouths brimming over with affection, with lamentations over going into work in six, seven hours.

She walks her to her door, bites at her lip and shuffles her feet when they reach the landing – too close for friends, too far apart for her liking. They’re swallowed by the darkness of her broken porch light, but Bernie can see the grin that plays on Serena’s mouth as she leans in close.

‘This is where you’re supposed to kiss me I think’, she whispers.

So that’s what Bernie does. Kisses her and kisses her, mouth clumsy on her mouth - all teeth and tongues, messy, wondrous. The material beneath her hands, wraps tightly around Serena’s waist and shifts as Serena shifts closer, as Bernie backs her against her own door – feet between her feet, leg between her legs; and Serena moans.

It’s only when Serena pulls away a little to fumble for her keys, to catch her breath, that Bernie makes a half-hearted attempt at _goodnight_ , against the line of Serena’s jaw, against the column of her neck.

‘I – I should – I should go’, she mumbles, untangling herself a little, moving away a little, into the dull light of the street-lamp. But Serena grasps for her, for the lapel of her coat, moves her hands underneath it to tangle herself in the belt-loops of Bernie’s jeans, fingers resting against the bare skin of her hips. She is breathless, very close, her lips well-kissed, chest heaving.

‘Come inside?’

And Serena grins, wide, so Bernie can feel the upturned corner of her mouth on her cheek, when she mumbles against the shell of her ear.

‘I thought you’d never ask.’


	3. come around later

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She feels like it shouldn’t feel like a first date, sitting outside her girlfriend’s house with her stomach in knots - stilling her trembling hands, stilling the nervous bounce of her leg.
> 
> Set after Four Letter Word, when Serena asks her to come around later.

She asks her if she’ll come over later, and it’s all Bernie can do not to fall apart.

Her mouth feels like cotton wool. Her mouth taste like tobacco and endless cups of coffee, and her body is wound tight and pulled apart, all at once, a collection of aching limbs upright in squeaky shoes. She wants to cry. She wants to sleep for a week. She wants to run away, run _far_ away.  She wants to close the distance between herself and Serena (sitting to tie the laces of her running shoes) wants to crawl into her lap, smooth the low slump of her shoulder, smooth the lines that form, stay, at the top of her nose, with her fingers, with her mouth.

But she doesn’t, because she can’t. She shuffles her feet instead, ducks her head and echoes Serena, when she works her mouth into a smile, when she moves past her, mumbles –

‘See you at home?’

‘See you at home.'

She keeps herself busy instead, does the calculations instead. She counts the minutes, while she counts heartbeats, while she undresses, dresses, in the quiet, in the dark of the locker room, while she walks to her car. She doesn’t mind the distance so much, the long walk to the parking spot around the corner. She knows she needs more time. She needs time.

            ( _Seventy-six minutes, seventy-three with the wind behind her. Walk fast._

_Check the mail. Check on Jason. Pour a glass of wine. Don’t pour a glass of wine._

_Climb the stairs. Eleven stairs. Don’t look at her room. Go to bedroom. Take off clothes. Stand in the shower. Don’t cry. Don’t cry._ Don’t cry. _Twenty minutes_ ).

-

 

She feels a little foolish.

She sits in the car outside for a little while, her fingers drumming an anxious beat ( _one, one, two, one_ ) on the steering wheel. The takeaway, which litters the back seat, is getting cold, she knows, but she’s _scared._

She hasn’t been here for weeks. She knows Serena’s house back to front, by now – knows where she keeps the tea, knows where she hides the chocolate. She has a chair in the lounge room, has a side of the bed. She knows the bin day – would heave dead bouquet upon dead bouquet in a pile, drag it to the curb first thing in the morning, in her nightshirt and slippers, while Serena slept, if Serena slept. But she hasn’t slept over, hasn’t had dinner, not for weeks. Serena had asked for space, and Bernie had given it, has kept herself where Serena had wanted her -  arm’s length. So when she had peered at her with her wide brown eyes, with her wine-stained blouse and her tear-stained face, reeled her back in; Bernie didn’t know what to do.

She feels adolescent. She feels a little heady, a little apprehensive, a little desperate to give her what she wants, desperate to get back to what they were. She feels lost.

She feels like it shouldn’t feel like a first date, sitting outside her girlfriend’s house with her stomach in knots - stilling her trembling hands, stilling the nervous bounce of her leg.

‘Get it together, Wolfe’, she mumbles, as she drags herself out of the car, as she juggles the bags of food, the box of pizza, between her hands, extending a leg forward to push open the small, creaking gate. She rearranges her load, when she reaches the landing, uses her elbow to press the doorbell; shuffles her feet, arranges her mouth into something like a smile.

-

 

Her hair is damp from the shower, her face wiped clear of make up, and she looks very young, and ten years older, all at once.

R A M C is printed – fading – across the front of the large sweater, which swallows Serena’s narrow shoulders, her curved frame, the fraying hem brushing the middle of her thigh; and the sight stops the words just short of Bernie’s lips, the syllables tangled up in her tongue, her heart in her throat. She’d adopted it as her own, one very cold morning at Bernie’s place just before Christmas, picked up off the floor and thrown over her naked frame, a string of ( _fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck_ )  tumbling from her lips, as the early morning snow had begun to fall outside; grinning wide when Bernie said it suited her, grinning wide when Bernie had propped herself up on an elbow to kiss her – unsure, enamoured.

There had been a quiet, tender fearlessness, a cautious enthusiasm to Bernie’s postbellum affection – in the way she searched for Serena’s hand before she held it tight, the way she bounced up and down, back and forth, on the balls and the heels of her feet, indecisive, before she moved forward to kiss her good night, good morning, good luck, good job, the way she always, always asked her and asked her and asked her ( _can I touch you here?_ )( _can I kiss you there?) (can I stay the night?)_

She thinks she ought to kiss her now. She thinks she’d like to kiss her, very much. But she cannot bring herself to ask, thinks it might not be allowed.

Instead she lifts up the bags in her hands, thrusts the pizza box towards her, a peace offering which Serena takes, wordlessly.

‘I thought you might be hungry, but – but I wasn’t sure – there’s no pineapple,  I promise’, she trips over the syllables, and a ghost of a smile appears on Serena’s mouth as she peers inside the box, as Bernie adds, ‘It’s from our place’.

‘And the other?’ she asks, nodding towards the bag, which bulges with food, warm against Bernie’s leg.

‘Oh, um, Thai. From that place you like down the road. I got all sorts. Or - Or I could cook? I make a mean – a _mean_ mac-and-cheese, I’ve been told’.

Bernie searches for words, for something, for a response, a joke at the expense of her terrible cooking, but Serena just stands, just leans on doorway, pizza box in hand, watches her, expressionless. A lengthy, awkward silence settles between them, which Serena makes no effort to break, and Bernie doesn’t know how to. The low dribble of sound from the television in the next room, the music of the crickets, the buzz of the breaking porch light, are the noises which save them from being swallowed up by their impasse. Bernie thinks she should take the hint. She gestures back towards her car, her voice light, her head heavy, because she was so desperately happy to be there, because she wants whatever Serena wants.

‘Or I can go?’ she says, puts the bags down on the threshold, begins to turn away when Serena catches her by the sleeve of her coat. The pizza box clatters unceremoniously to the floor as she steps outside and quickly, firmly, kisses Bernie. There’s nothing clumsy about it, nothing unsure. It’s steady and certain and full of feeling, of enviable confidence, and _love_ , and she doesn’t loosen her grip on her sleeve, on the buttons unbuttoned, unthreading, on her coat – even as she pulls away, catches her breath.

‘Don’t go’, she mumbles, kisses her again. ‘Come inside’.

-

 

‘You don’t have to do that’, Serena says, gestures to Bernie’s hands plunged in the dishwater, elbow deep in bubbles, and her presence makes Bernie jump, the edge to her voice makes her shoulders square.

They’d rescued the food from the landing, the pizza unharmed, the Thai lukewarm. They’d eaten on a little blanket in the lounge room, Bernie leaning against the legs of her chair, the relative silence punctuated by the quiz show soft and low on the television, by Bernie’s competition (ongoing, affectionate) with Jason – to beat him to the right answer. She’d watched Serena, who hadn’t said a thing, who’d chewed half-heartedly on dinner. She looked wrecked, looked more exhausted than any human had the right to be, and a little on edge, but her gaze had softened a little when Bernie had furrowed a brow, cocked a worried head at her, and she had squeezed her calf, which rests next to her, had played an absent-minded tune on her bare foot. She looked a little less miserable, and glad to have her here, and love, and worry, fill up Bernie’s body, her lungs, her limbs, the ends of every nerve, and she feels like she might drown.

‘You don’t have to do that’, Serena says, from the entrance of the kitchen, as Bernie scrubs at the lipstick on Serena’s mug, at the food on the plates, after Jason’s gone to bed. The kettle nearby screeches, plays at the edges of Bernie’s burgeoning headache. She presses a finger to her temple, and Serena hurries over, snaps it off with a flick of her wrist, and turns to look at Bernie, whose hands have stilled. Her tone was terse, impatient, and she hadn’t meant it – Bernie can see her bite at her lip, squeeze her eyes closed. She reaches forward, careful, a hand against her forearm, and then tries again.

‘You don’t have to do that’, she mumbles, and shuffles behind her, her chin resting on her shoulder, briefly, pulling her hands from the sink and holding them in her own, soap bubbles between their fingers. ‘I’m sorry’.

Bernie lets her head fall, her hair coming away from her messy ponytail, her eyes closed, face red from the steam, rising from the sink, rising from the kettle, contorted with the effort of holding back tears. Serena takes the chance to press her mouth to the nape of Bernie’s neck, bent, to let her mouth brush against the tense muscles, the knots that form at the top of her shoulder. A low, heaving sob escapes Bernie, her shoulders shuddering, when Serena starts to mumble.

‘You looked after me so well, and I never asked if you were okay’, she says, and Bernie starts, turns in Bernie’s arms, furrows her brow, grips at the loose material of her own sweater, on Serena’s frame, catches her gaze with a firm stare, a resolute tone.

‘This isn’t about me’, Serena ignores her, pulls her closer.

‘I never even thanked you for not running away’, she says, and it stings. Bernie bristles at the frank reminder of her old self, her untethered self, her terrified self, can’t quite meet Serena’s eye.

But Serena’s face is earnest, her voice is earnest. They know each other too well for platitudes, care about each other too much for skirting around the truth. Bernie fought every urge to leave, every natural instinct to escape – when things were too hard, when life was too much – too messy, too complicated, too real. Serena loves her for staying, when all she wanted to do was go; tells her as much – moves closer, pressing Bernie against the sink, so that the tail of her shirt trails in the water, so that every part of them is touching. Bernie can feel the steady heave of her chest. She can feel the warmth of her thighs. She can feel her knees against her knees, toes against her toes, mouth against the corner of her mouth, as she tells her she loves her, she loves her. She loves her.


	4. any room for me in your future plans?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She looks a little dishevelled. She looks strung tight and pulled apart, her bag heaved over her shoulder and her brow furrowed as she works her way through the crowd of passengers that spill through the arrivals gate. She looks exhausted. She looks gorgeous, and Serena doesn't know how she did without her for so long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sabbatical!Feelings. Sorry this took me a MILLION years. Thank you for all your loveliness :)

She asks her to visit; with her head in the crook of her neck, hopeful mouth against her bedwarm skin.

They are huddled together on the front steps of her house, passport clutched in her hand, scarf flung around her neck. Bernie had shuffled dutifully out of bed, stretched out yawns and rubbed at her eyes as she helped her gather every last bit she needed, every part of Serena Campbell she cares to take with her (the rest discarded, left with Bernie). She had nodded, smiled, squeezed her hand; when she had asked her if she didn’t mind locking up, if she didn’t mind not coming to the airport. She doesn’t want a long goodbye, she says. Can’t endure it, she knows.

She waits, instead, until she hears the soft screech of the taxi brakes. She waits until she can see the headlights, in the dull four am fog, to turn, to look at her, to fling her arms around her middle, bury her head in the space above her right shoulder. She can feel Bernie freeze, reconfigure, let a hand come to rest at the nape of her short hair; the other gripping the material of her coat.

‘Will you visit me?’ 

‘Where?

‘I don’t know’, she mumbles, muffled by material, choked by the hitch in her voice, the rock in her throat. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know where she’s going, not really, and she knows she shouldn’t ask, couldn’t,  _musn’t_ ask Bernie to wait for her, come to her. But she can’t bear to stay; and she can’t bear to leave her. ‘Somewhere?’

Bernie breathes out a smile against the line of her hair, against the frown that forms, curves, makes creases in her forehead; before she pulls away, appraises her. She moves her hand beneath Serena’s coat, beneath her scarf and her blouse, splays her fingers out against her clavicle, above her breasts. Her trembling hand steadies, still and warm against her tight chest, calm against her frantic heart. ‘Anywhere.’

The taxi driver leans on his horn then, loud and impatient in the quiet suburban street, and the hesitant smile which had grown on her face drops, her shoulders drop. They are, suddenly, a jumble, a mess, a collection of suitcases; an assortment of scarves, and stairs, and syllables she can’t quite get her tongue around ( _love you, love you, love you_ ). Instead she bites her lip, clears her throat, peers at her.

Bernie bounces on the balls, on the heels, of her bare feet, arms wrapped around her middle. Her cardigan is buttoned up in the wrong places, her hair askew, and sleeplessness (weeks and weeks of it, months and months of it) sits in the corner of her eyes, in the tight edges of her mouth. She’s ruined her, she thinks. She’s ruined her life.

(She hasn’t.)

She hesitates for a moment, lets out a shaky breath, before she presses her lips to Bernie’s. The kiss is quick and firm and final, and she stumbles blindly down the staircases, shuffles blindly into the back seat. She doesn’t look back. She doesn’t speak to her for weeks.

 

*

 

She can’t settle.

Of course, she's tried – apartments in Paris and bedsits in Prague, lengthy train rides that wound their way across countries. She makes friends with the man who drove the water taxi in Venice – stuffs herself full of food and wine, falls asleep on his couch, wakes up with a cracking headache, a miserable hangover. She flirts with the woman who runs a tiny restaurant in Madrid, and they fumble their way through bilingual endearments, harmless affection, free glasses of wine. She even goes to Kiev. She wraps herself up tight and fights against the wind, flashes her credentials and a smile so she can wander through the hospital corridors, see what sort of mark Bernie Wolfe had left.

But she doesn’t know what to do with herself. Her bones jangle, feel frail and delicate. Her head beats a constant, unsteady rhythm, every end of every nerve is a live wire, and her heart is a burden (unbearable, intolerable). Her heart is a piece of luggage, to be dragged around from city to city, town to town, couch to couch – tired and sore and heavy, filled to the brim with Elinor.

‘Things will be different, in Boston’, Bernie sys, voice slow and groggy and surprised; when Serena calls her late one night, perched on the edge of the hotel bed. She hadn't been able to sleep. The room was too quiet, and the bed was too big, cold, unfamiliar, and she felt sick for worrying, sick for missing her.

She doesn’t apologise for calling, doesn’t apologise for not; just lets the tears flow long and wild, her breath ragged, heart swelling at the sound of her voice, asks her (between sobs, between hiccups) what the _fuck_ she's doing wrong.

‘H-how?’

 ‘You’ll be busy. It’ll take your mind off things.’

‘And if it doesn’t?’

Bernie had made Harvard the light at the end of a very long tunnel, had made it the panacea for Serena’s ills since she had told her about it (months ago, quiet and uncertain, one night on the couch). Serena had shrugged it off, a polite _no, thank you_ to her very old friend; whose offer of a position came low and pitying over the cross-Atlantic crackle of the shoddy phone line. She couldn’t see her way through, in the fog of grief, couldn’t see how revisiting the place where she had been her most miserable all those years ago could possibly help.

It was only after everything, with Jasmine, with Jason, the night on the roof, that she would call her. It was only in the dull light of the morning after, where things seemed a little clearer, where Bernie breathed soft and low and steady in the bed behind her, that she would say _hey, yeah, why not._ Maybe it would fix things, maybe it would be for the best.

She could hear the rustle of bed sheets now as Bernie sat up, could hear a deep and shaky sigh.

‘Then you can come home.’

‘I don’t wanna come home.’

‘Then - ’ she clears her throat, and her voice is tight, sounds like she does when she’s trying not to cry (pursed lips, self-restraint). ‘Then I’ll come to you.’

 

*

 

She looks a little dishevelled. She looks strung tight and pulled apart, her bag heaved over her shoulder and her brow furrowed as she works her way through the crowd of passengers that spill through the arrivals gate. She looks exhausted. She looks _gorgeous_ , and Serena doesn't know how she did without her for so long.

‘Woman on a mission’, she says, when Bernie is close enough to hear her, over the crackle of the loudspeaker, the roar of the crowds around them.

Bernie lets out a shaky laugh, a trembling smile, a stuttered _always,_ and she wants to kiss her. She’s desperate to kiss her; but she doesn’t know if she’ll be allowed. She’s spent weeks, months, pushing her away; folding in on herself so she won’t get hurt, so she won’t hurt her and now – now she doesn’t know; doesn’t know where they end.

She reaches forward, instead, moves a haphazard strand of hair from in front of her eyes, let her fingers linger around her tired face, her gentle mouth curved in a gentle smile.

‘Hey big shot’, she mumbles, shuffling closer. _God,_ she wants to kiss her.

(Bernie kisses her in the taxi, on the way to her apartment. Bernie leans over in the backseat, seatbelt pressing into her hip, puts her hand on Serena’s hands, gathered together on her lap. Bernie kisses her.)

They drop her bag by the front door, next to the pile of shoes, beneath the array of coloured scarves; and she offers a tour of her apartment – a wide smile, a sweeping gesture.

Her place is small, rooms that spill onto each other – kitchen and bedroom and a couch (old and tattered) tucked away in the corner. She tried to clean up a little, yesterday, but there are lesson plans strewn over the kitchen table, a collection of mugs in the sink, slippers kicked into the corridor that leads to the bathroom. There are coffee stains on tables, muted headlines blaring on the television and photographs propped up on the window sill that peers out onto the university. She’s made a life here, a mark here, she supposes; has let her body grow roots into the scuffed wooden floors, and behind the old flowered wallpaper.

There’s an ease about the way she moves around the place, turns off the television, changes her shoes. She readjusts the picture frames, which have gone askew (her daughter, her nephew, her partner all peering up at her), talks and talks and talks about their plans for the day, almost misses the rise and fall of Bernie’s furrowed brow, her quizzical mouth, her half-closed eyes, squinted in confusion.

‘You should get glasses already’, she smiles, moving closer, moving a hand down Bernie’s arm to grasp at her fingers. Bernie clears her throat, shakes her head, breathes out a laugh. 

‘I will if you will.’

‘No chance. You alright?’

‘Perfect – let’s – let’s go’, she says, blows an errant strand of hair from in front of her face, squeezes Serena’s thumb with the pad of her thumb; lets herself be dragged out the door. 

She holds her hand in the elevator, holds her hand in line for coffee, holds her hand as they stumble down stairs, shuffle across an empty lecture theatre, prop their feet up on the seats in front of them, and Serena talks about the students, about the teachers, about the figures she left scrawled in marker on the board from the week before.

 

*

 

She holds her hand in the back of the taxi, holds it (tighter) at the front door of the house they arrive at, in the cool evening air – tangles, untangles, tangles their fingers as they’re welcomed inside.

There is a glut of people, swarming around the food, and the rest milling in the living room.  As they’re ushered inside she can the roar of academic fun, of middle-aged parties (wine, and small talk, and quiet, gentle bitching). The sense of relief, freedom from marking papers, is palpable; and there is a general murmur of happy surprise when Serena rounds the corner, Bernie in tow. She’s greeted, quickly, warmly. There are a dozen or so enveloping hugs, a few kisses to the cheek, enquiries after her health, enquiries after the woman at her side. Her heart swells with pride at the sight of it - Bernie’s modest blushes, people’s awe, admiration, surprise – as she introduces her to new friend upon new friend (Major Wolfe) (trauma surgeon) (partner) ( _partner_ ).  

She wants Bernie to be proud of her, too. She wants her to grin, to tell her it was worth it, leaving her behind. She wants her to be happy that she’s settled here, settled finally; that’s she’s found people who like her, found people she likes.

But she knows her well enough, knows her the most. She can see the way her free hand clenches, unclenches, short nails making marks in her palm; she can see her face contort to paint a smile across a frown; she can feel her whole body strain to keep herself there, keep herself from running. She holds tight, holds on, person after person, minute after minute, until she knows she can’t bear it – watches her make her excuses, slip outside.

She finds her perched on the front steps, digging through Serena’s handbag until she unearths a lighter. There’s a cigarette dangling perilously from her lips; and she’s grumbling.

‘I thought you quit’, she says, as she places her coat around her shoulders, moves to sit down beside her, shoulder to shoulder, thigh against thigh. She fumbles with the lighter, shakes it, vainly, violently, failing to spark it.

‘I thought you quit too – ah, _fuck -_ ’

Serena stills her hands with her own then, plucks it from her fingers.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing’, she says, quick, stretching over, cupping her hand around the flame. Serena holds it forward, watches the cigarette light, watches her take a long drag, watches her kick the loose gravel from the step in front of her. She watches her for a moment, indecisive, upset, as they pass the cigarette between them, bridging the uncomfortable silence. She doesn’t want to push. She doesn’t want to lose her.

‘I know they can be a bit much’, she says, eventually, gestures inside, tries for a smile.

‘It’s not them, Serena.’

‘Oh’, she says, puts all her effort into keeping her breathing steady, her voice light. 'Me, then?’

‘Wha – no – God, _no_ ’, Bernie says, turns towards her, desperate. She opens her mouth, closes it again, hands flying out towards her and retreating back into her lap. She stumbles, stutters, turns back to face the drive, looks like she’s trying very hard not to cry. ‘It’s stupid.’

 Bernie flicks the cigarette, and the end of it burns slowly, smoulders as she holds her head towards the sky, takes a very deep breath. Her shoulders heave, and her knees bounce, and she chews at her lip.

‘I thought I was here to rescue you’, she says, very quietly, very quickly, peers up at Serena as she takes a shaky puff.

Her brow furrows, confused, and Bernie shrugs, half-heartedly, embarrassed.

‘I thought – when you called, that you, um, that you needed me – or something. Like we said.’

 ‘I do need you.’

‘No, you don’t. You’re – you’re happy’, she says, a genuine, trembling smile across her sad, lonely face; and she gestures behind her to the party, in front of her to the town – the speckled lights of the university dorm rooms just visible from where they are. ‘You’ve got people, and a place, and some really terrible coffee - ’

‘It’s the worst’, she says, breathes out a laugh, and Bernie’s shoulders shake.

 ‘And you’re settled.’

‘I suppose…’

 ‘And it _sucks._ ’

She stills her hands with her own, takes the nub of the cigarette from her restless fingers and drops it on the ground, grinds it into the cement beneath her shoe, before shuffling close. She tangles their fingers together in Bernie’s lap, leans forward, so her nose is against her cheek for a moment, mumbles _sweetheart, sweetheart, sweetheart,_ against her blushing face.

‘I’m a terrible person.’

‘No. No, you’re not’, Serena breathes, lets her head fall into the crook of her neck, her lips against the the jut of her collarbone. She squeezes her hands. She kisses her, kisses her again. ‘You’re my favourite person.’

She can feel her shake her head and she straightens, catches her faltering gaze, very close. There is a gathering of wrinkles around her eyes that weren’t there before, tears that threaten to spill over on to her cheeks, pink lips and a smattering of freckles, and she _loves_ her.

‘Yeah’, she breathes, nods, certain. ‘My fucking _hero.’_

 

*

 

They excuse themselves early, don’t say a word on the way back, don’t say a word in the elevator or the corridor, or through the front door, where they’re swallowed in the dark of her warm and empty home, moon behind the clouds, clouds behind her curtain.

She doesn’t bother with the lamps, with the light switch behind Bernie’s shoulder as she presses her against the wall, shuffles her coat off. They undress each slowly, wordlessly, shoes flung under the bed, a tangle of bras and pants on the floor near the radiator, Bernie’s blouse chucked somewhere on the small desk; atop a pile of books.

They fumble blindly, slowly, around each other, relearn each other this way (quiet, in the dark) - her leg between her legs, chest against her heaving chest, clumsy kisses landing on the edge of her lip, beside her nose, against her jaw. She tastes like whisky, and old cigarettes, and tears that have landed on her lips, made tracks down her cheek; and there’s a whimper, a moan that untangles from her tongue as they move against each other. Serena covers her mouth with her mouth, muffles their sounds from escaping through the thin walls, from beneath the door, as they move _(faster, more, yes, please)_ until they’re trembling, until they come – come apart.

 

*

 

She’ll miss her in the mornings. She’ll miss her like this, unkempt, a little gruff, bed-warm, well-kissed and here – in her apartment, on her couch, in the midst of the slow process of waking up.

Bernie’s hair is a halo of knots, and sleep sits on her shoulders, gathers at the corner of her eyes. She is a mess of their clothes (a borrowed cardigan, borrowed slippers, no bra, no makeup) and a jumble of grimace and frown as she stares down at the mug, cradled between her hands: an unhappy appraisal, a sight to behold.

‘Jesus, Serena, this _coffee_ ’, she says, and Serena pads over to her.

‘You get used to it.’

‘Don’t get too used to it.’

There’s a pause, a moment, where Bernie peers up at her, wide-eyed, searching. She knows, knows she wants her to come home, knows she wants to start over – live a life with her. But she’s lighter here, for now. She likes it here, for now, coffee and all. And she’s not coming home. Not yet.

She hears the clatter of the mug on the coffee table as she edges closer, as Bernie tugs on the waistline of her pyjama pants. She clambers onto her lap, shuffles forward, feels her hands on her hips, feels her thighs between her thighs. The coffee has stained Bernie's upper lip and sleep sits on her shoulders, gathers at the corners of her eyes; and her hands slip a little below the waistline of her pants, so that she is closer, so that their bodies are flush. She lets her head fall forward, forehead against her forehead.

‘Promise.’


End file.
